A Christian charity Barnabas Fund has claimed that Australia rejects ’80 per cent of Christian refugees’ who had been facing genocide in their homelands Iraq and Syria. Barnabas Fund claims that majority of the refugees who had entered Australia were not Christians- roughly 300 visas were granted to Muslims.

A the humanitarian crisis caused by mass exodus of people from Middle East, has resulted in tens and thousands of Christian displaced from their homelands. In the midst of refugee crisis, Christian church leaders have urged the government of Australian to accommodate more religiously persecuted Christians from Syria and Iraq on humanitarian basis.

In line with details, the government of Australia has rejected 80 per cent of refugee status applications submitted on behalf of the Syrian and Iraqi Christians. These applications were submitted by the Barnabas Fund; and the applicants were majority of former Muslims from Syrian and Iraqi who had converted to Christianity.

Barnabas Fund claims that the on the contrary, Australia had granted visas to Muslim refugees who has arrived from the UNHCR camps; these refugees were not persecuted back in their countries. A facilitator of Barnabas Fund Jude Simion stated: “In our experience 80 per cent of our applications for Muslim converts have been rejected.”

Barnabas Fund claims that about 80 per cent of above 300 applications from the Syrian and Iraqi Christian refugees submitted to the Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s office were rejected. Those rejected visas converted to Christianity a long time ago. The charity further complained that Australia had accepted more than 4000 from Syria and Iraq while Barnabas raised $1.2 million to fund the expenses of 1048 Christian refugees.

Jude Simion stated that Barnabas Fund has always sought to highlight the plight of Christians. Australia’s government was urged to take in refugees persecuted on the basis of religion in their own countries on the humanitarian basis.

The Managing director of Barnabas Fund, Colin Johnston asserted that there are other persecuted minorities’ refugees still marooned on the war-torn countries that in desperate need of help, not just Christians. ‘Over a million Christians have been displaced from Iraq and Syria, for example. There are countless others who desperately need help,’ he said.